It is generally agreed that there continues to be a need for highly effective non-nutritive and non-cariogenic sweetening agents. Insufficient information exists for a rational design of novel, sweet-tasting molecules which can serve as prototypes for the development of sweeter and safer compounds.
Incidental to a study of perfumes and odor-modifying agents, Kovats, et al., in U.S. Pat. No. 3,928,456, discovered that certain cycloaliphatic, unsaturated ketones possessed flavoring and taste-modifying properties. Similar discoveries were reported by Schulte-Elte, et al., in U.S. Pat. No. 4,147,672.
Resort to the plant kingdom has afforded several types of intensely sweet compounds, including a dihydroisocoumarin (phyllodulcin), certain glycosides, and the proteinaceous thaumatin, all of which serve as sugar substitutes in one or more countries.
An optically active, sweet sesquiterpene, hernandulcin, has been isolated from the herb Lippia dulcis Trev. (Verbenaceae) which is indigenous to Mexico. Following elucidation of its structure, methods have been devised for the synthesis of related structures.